Get Up Kids' Matt Pryor Calls Weezer 'Jackasses'

For the 10th anniversary reissue of their landmark album, 'Something to Write Home About,' the Get Up Kids compiled years of archival footage for a bonus DVD. Among the many highlights is a scene where the Kansas City punks took part in the time-honored rock tradition of smashing their equipment to bits. "That was the last date of the 2001 tour we did opening for Weezer," frontman Matt Pryor tells Spinner. "We just smashed all of our s---. It seemed like a fun thing to do at the time."

The decimation of the instruments wasn't as wanton as it might seem. "Oh, it was totally planned, like 'Top that, bitch!'" says Pryor. "It was very Jerry Lee Lewis of us." Surprisingly, the stunt got no reaction from Rivers Cuomo and his bandmates. In fact, Weezer never reacted to anything the Get Up Kids did. "They never said anything to us for that entire tour," Pryor recalls. "They're the only band I've toured with for a month that I've never spoken to. They're jackasses."

Pryor also recalls a night in Milwaukee, where the Get Up Kids and Weezer were playing, when, for unknown reasons, Weezer declined to share the stage with two rock legends. "The guys in Cheap Trick [Robin Zander and Rick Nielsen] were in town playing the Enormo Dome and their kids are fans of ours and fans of Weezer. [Cheap Trick] asked Weezer if they wanted to play a song together, they said no and we were like 'Yeah! We'll do it!'" he recalls. "We did 'Hello There' and 'Surrender.' Rick Nielsen borrowed a guitar from Weezer -- this really beautiful Les Paul Custom -- and he just handed it out to the crowd when he was done with it."

Though the Get Up Kids got to keep all their instruments, they did lose out on one thing to Zander and Nielsen's kids. "They hung out backstage and drank all of our beer," Pryor says, noting that he didn't know how old the kids were. "Then their dads came down and yelled at them, 'You guys, get in the limo!'"

See? Even rock star dads can lay down the law from time to time.